The 2007 Presidential
Report

An Address
Delivered by
Marc Maurer
National Federation of the Blind
Atlanta, Georgia
July 3, 2007

The
National Federation of the Blind has never been in better health. The challenges
we face are many, but we know what we must do to meet them. We have learned
from our experiences and from our predecessors in the Federation who have stood
in the ranks since the time of our founding in 1940, and we are prepared to
do battle in whatever arena may be necessary to protect the rights and procure
the opportunities for the blind.

We are in
almost every city in the nation, in every state, the District of Columbia, and
Puerto Rico. We are professionals, students, parents of blind children, teachers,
rehabilitation workers, employees of workshops for the blind, newly blinded
people, blind seniors, blind people seeking employment, blind people with training
in the skills of blindness and those without it; we are the blind from every
part of our culture and every segment of society. We are the National Federation
of the Blind.

Last year
at the convention of the National Federation of the Blind we inaugurated our
public relations initiative, directed by John Paré, who, at the close
of this convention, becomes our executive director for strategic initiatives.
James Gashel, who has served as the chief of our Washington office, the director
of governmental affairs, and the executive director for strategic initiatives,
is retiring from service in the National Federation of the Blind after more
than thirty-four years as an employee of our movement. Jim Gashel is among the
most imaginative thinkers in the field of blindness. He has written much of
the legislation affecting blind people, has directed the development of policy
and regulation regarding the blind in most areas of government and in the private
sector, and has been among the most aggressive advocates of programs for the
blind and individual rights for blind people in the United States. He is beginning
a new career as an executive with K-NFB Reading Technology, Inc., the entity
that in partnership with the National Federation of the Blind developed and
is selling the handheld reading machine. We express our gratitude to Jim Gashel
for his service, but we also appreciate his tutelage of John Paré.

As director
of public relations, John Paré has helped us to gain recognition of the
work of the National Federation of the Blind in more than 250 television interviews,
more than 500 online Internet articles, more than 600 newspaper articles, and
more than 600 radio interviews. CNN broadcast a nine-minute news piece featuring
the Kurzweil–National Federation of the Blind Reader. The Wall Street Journal
published an extensive article on the same topic, and Good Morning America
broadcast a demonstration of the reader performed by John Paré. This
single interview was estimated to be valued at approximately $235,000.

John Paré
and Chris Danielsen were invited to the Associated Press headquarters in New
York City for an interview about our Target lawsuit. They provided material
to the Washington Post about the Library of Congress digital Talking
Book program, which appeared in an editorial, dated May 30, 2007, endorsing
the plan to create digital Talking Books.

Through our
public relations initiative, we have placed editorials with the USA Today
newspaper and the New York Times. In addition John Paré has
arranged for interviews on the National Public Radio program All Things
Considered and on the Fox News Channel’s prime-time program Your World
with Neil Cavuto. Altogether the public relations effort within the last
year has brought the work of the National Federation of the Blind to the attention
of the public with more than 600 million audience impressions.

The NFB-NEWSLINE®
program is thriving with forty-one states and the District of Columbia now sponsoring
the service. Oregon, Vermont, and Delaware have been added in the past year;
95 percent of the population of the United States has access to NFB-NEWSLINE.
In April the Wilmington News Journal joined the NFB-NEWSLINE program
as the 250th newspaper on the service and the twenty-fifth added this year.
We continue to offer both UPI and Associated Press wire services, and we have
added television listings. NFB-NEWSLINE may be received by email. The service
currently has over 57,000 registered users and provides more than 2.5 million
minutes of news per month.

In 2004 we
successfully included provisions of the Instructional Materials Accessibility
Act in amendments to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. These
amendments require that publishers provide to a central depository an electronic
copy of textbooks sold to the public schools so that blind students may receive
an accessible book in Braille or in another format. This model of textbook accessibility
is being incorporated in proposed legislation to make college-level books accessible
to the blind. Congressman Raúl Grijalva of Arizona is leading our effort
in the House of Representatives, and Senator Christopher Dodd of Connecticut
is promoting legislation in the United States Senate. Some people in the publishing
business are opposing this proposed legislation, but we are determined that
blind students will not be shunted aside or forgotten or cut out of the educational
process. We will attend the colleges of our choice, and we will expect the same
kinds of educational experiences that are available to everybody else. The publishers
would not hear us when we said this for blind grade-school and high-school students.
They do not want to hear us today, but we have made up our minds. Blind college
students will have their books.

The Help America
Vote Act (HAVA), adopted in 2002, contains provisions guaranteeing the right
of blind voters to cast independent secret ballots by 2006. These provisions,
drafted by the National Federation of the Blind, are not self-executing. We
are doing what we can to ensure their enforcement. In November of 2006 we conducted
an election-day review of the experiences of blind voters. On our voter comment
line we received reports enthusiastically reviewing the experience of those
able to cast a ballot independently for the first time as well as those who
felt the frustration and disappointment of being unable to vote without assistance
despite the legal requirements that this be a part of the voting process. We
are sharing the data we collected about the violations of the Help America Vote
Act with the Department of Justice. The right to vote without interference and
without public scrutiny is fundamental to American democracy, and we expect
to have as much access to this right as anybody else.

Some members
of Congress want to amend the Help America Vote Act by requiring voting machines
to have a paper verification of the voters’ choices. We have said that we do
not object to voter verification systems but that we insist that we maintain
the right to vote independently and privately. Some of the proposed changes
would diminish this independent private right to vote for the blind. We fought
for the right to cast a secret ballot, and we insist that this right must be
maintained.

Since 1936
the Randolph-Sheppard Act has authorized blind vendors to operate facilities
on federal property. In 1974 this act was expanded to include cafeterias and
to provide extensive appeal procedures to vendors with grievances.

Within the
last few years those operating workshops for the severely handicapped have sought
to take opportunities from blind vendors, transferring them to the sheltered
shops. The argument they make is that only one blind vendor benefits from a
lucrative contract but that many disabled workers benefit from operations conducted
by sheltered shops. This argument might have some appeal except that sheltered
shop management almost never includes blind people, and the managers of sheltered
shops are ordinarily not disabled. The big money always goes to the sighted,
nondisabled managers. The amount received by the blind is a small sum compared
to that paid to the sighted. Sometimes the wages paid to the disabled are below
the federal minimum wage.

Several months
ago a provision in the Defense Department budget directed that negotiations
occur among the Department of Defense, which operates military installations;
the Department of Education, which has statutory responsibility for the Randolph-Sheppard
program; and the Committee for Purchase from People Who Are Blind or Severely
Disabled, the federal agency responsible for distributing federal contracts
through NIB and NISH to sheltered workshops for the blind and severely handicapped
respectively. In these negotiations the Department of Education failed completely
in its responsibility to protect and preserve the priority for blind vendors.
In conjunction with other organizations, the National Federation of the Blind
established this year the Blind Entrepreneurial Alliance to advance the argument
that the Randolph-Sheppard program contains a statutory priority for blind vendors
on federal property, including military installations. Linchpin Strategies,
a consulting firm located in Washington, D. C., has been hired to represent
the interests of the Blind Entrepreneurial Alliance. Our investment in this
consulting firm appears to be paying off. Catriona Macdonald, the president
of Linchpin, will be appearing later during this convention.

The digital
Talking Book is a concept that has been discussed by the National Library Service
for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress, the National
Federation of the Blind, and all other interested entities dealing with blindness
for more than a decade. Prior to the convention of the National Federation of
the Blind last summer, we learned that questions about the planning for this
program were being raised by a staff member of the House Committee on Appropriations.
We passed a resolution expressing support for the program. We have appeared
before hearings in the Senate and the House of Representatives. We have requested
funding for the next generation of Talking Books, and we will continue to articulate
the vital importance of the Books for the Blind program. We believe that the
planning has been more than adequate; we commend the leadership of the National
Library Service for its comprehensive and thoughtful development of this program;
and we believe it is time to move to the digital Talking Book.

At our convention
last year I reported that the Louis Braille Coin Bill, a piece of legislation
declaring that the Treasury should mint a commemorative coin in 2009 in honor
of the two-hundredth birthday of Louis Braille, had been passed by the House
of Representatives and the Senate. On July 27, 2006, President Bush signed this
bill into law. We are currently planning for the programs to be conducted in
conjunction with the issuance of this commemorative coin. The proceeds from
the sale of Louis Braille coins will be used by the National Federation of the
Blind to promote Braille literacy.

The Louis
Braille Coin Bill has become the law of the land. Here are provisions from Public
Law 109-247:

The National
Federation of the Blind, the Nation's oldest membership organization consisting
of blind members, has been a champion of the Braille code, of Braille literacy
for all blind people and of the memory of Louis Braille, and continues its Braille
literacy efforts today through its divisions emphasizing Braille literacy, emphasizing
education of blind children, and emphasizing employment of the blind.
Braille literacy aids the blind in taking responsible and self-sufficient roles
in society, such as employment: while 70 percent of the blind are unemployed,
85 percent of the employed blind are Braille-literate.

That is the
law.

We have reached
an agreement with the Amazon company to ensure that Amazon itself is usable
by the blind but also that other retailers who employ Amazon’s platform for
their Web sites are encouraged to be blind-friendly. Amazon has pledged that
by the end of this year its site will be fully and equally accessible to the
blind, and by the time of next year’s convention, all impediments to accessibility
on Web sites for merchants who use Amazon’s platform will be removed.

Through our
Access Technology Initiative we have certified this year Web sites for the following
companies and organizations: General Electric; Guide Dogs for the Blind; Brown,
Goldstein, & Levy, LLP (the Baltimore law firm we have used for more than
twenty years); Legal Sea Foods; State of Diabetes Complications in America;
Merck & Co. Inc. (the first pharmaceutical company to be certified); USPEQ
(pronounced “you speak,” which is a Web-based survey company); Maryland Voter
Information Clearing House; and Quantum Simulations Measurement Tutor (the first
and only tutoring program for blind students based on artificial intelligence).

To improve
nonvisual access to technology, we have worked with the following companies
during the past year: Microsoft, Apple, Adobe, HumanWare, Freedom Scientific,
Google, Amazon, GE, Whirlpool, GW Micro, IBM, AOL, Mozilla, and Olympus. We
have also provided advice on accessibility to a number of universities and to
many government agencies.

On our fiftieth
birthday, in 1990, we decided to create the International Braille and Technology
Center for the Blind, a technology laboratory containing at least one of every
device or software program designed to offer information to the blind in Braille,
refreshable Braille, or auditory form. We have continued to maintain this technology
laboratory through the years, and we have acquired many new products to ensure
that it is up-to-date with the best state-of-the-art equipment and software
now available. We have acquired from twenty-two corporations or organizations
eighty-eight new products, new pieces of software, or software upgrades since
our last convention.

With the advent
of interactive visual displays, the blind have encountered increasingly difficult
problems in operating home appliances. The National Federation of the Blind
created the Accessible Home Showcase, which was completed as of January 2007
with products contributed by Whirlpool, GE, and a number of others. We continue
to seek methods for providing information on accessibility to manufacturers
of products that are to be used in the home.

Although we
concentrate on Braille and speech output in our access efforts, we have also
established this year a low-vision section of our International Braille and
Technology Center for the Blind. In this section we display a representative
sample of low-vision products from such companies as Vision, Inc., Enhanced
Vision, Freedom Scientific, and HumanWare.

Over the last
year the Jacobus tenBroek Library—a resource library on the advancements of
the blind—has made significant progress. This includes making available for
use the 3,000-volume blindness collection of print materials on loan to us from
the Iowa Department for the Blind; digitizing 80 percent of our Federation literature
for the NFB Web site; placing the newly designed Independence Market in the
library; and producing the new Jacobus tenBroek Library Resource Guide (a catalog
of aids, appliances, and materials), which is available in print and in Braille
and is searchable on our Web site.

Dr. Jacobus
tenBroek, our founding president and our great leader, was a lawyer and a constitutional
scholar. He wrote a number of books including a volume which changed the way
that legal scholars interpret the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of
the United States. In 2008 we will be hosting the first Jacobus tenBroek Disability
Law Symposium, entitled “Disability Law: From tenBroek to the 21st Century.”
We have already assembled a faculty for this symposium that includes the most
prestigious lawyers and legal scholars writing or practicing in the disability
field. The person to deliver the keynote address is the president of the National
Federation of the Blind.

The education
programs of the National Federation of the Blind Jernigan Institute continue
to grow in number and influence. After our convention last summer the third
annual Science Academy for the Blind took place at the National Center for the
Blind. The Rocket On! students conducted the most successful rocket launch to
date, sending a ten-foot sounding rocket six thousand feet into the atmosphere
with a perfect landing, permitting the rocket to be recovered in one piece.

The Science
Academy model is being implemented in places across the nation. In Montana Camp
Eureka continues to inspire blind students with programs of education in science
and nature, and in Utah our affiliate has engaged in a collaboration with Brigham
Young University to teach science to blind students there. The Web portal for
blind science (a Web site encouraging the study of science, technology, engineering,
and math), which we established last year, offers curricula for science education
for the blind, information tools about accessible scientific instrumentation,
techniques used by blind scientists, resources for information produced in accessible
formats, and other information to assist teachers. We continue to improve this
Web site, which (in addition to offering other advantages) represents our declaration
that the blind can participate along with others in these disciplines. This
is one of the elements of the unmistakable message of the National Federation
of the Blind.

We have formed
a partnership with Penn State University to develop a talking scientific multimeter.
Prototypes of the device are now being completed and will be tested in the next
few months.

Shortly after
this convention we will be undertaking, in partnership with the Johns Hopkins
University Whiting School of Engineering and the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration, the National Federation of the Blind Youth Slam. This dynamic
event will bring together two hundred blind high school students along with
seventy blind mentors and many other blind professionals for four days of inspiring
activities. Other Youth Slam sponsors include the UPS Foundation, the Honda
Foundation, the NEC Foundation of America, Northrop Grumman, the Verizon Foundation,
the American Chemical Society, and Pepsi.

Not all blind
people will want to study science or engineering, but many will. Blind students
have been told that these disciplines are too difficult for us. But this assessment
is wrong, and we intend to demonstrate that we have as much ability in this
arena as anybody else. Part of the demonstration will take place at the Youth
Slam.

The National
Center for Mentoring Excellence, a national mentoring project conducted by the
National Federation of the Blind and funded by the United States Department
of Education Rehabilitation Services Administration, is in its second year of
matching blind transition-age youth with positive blind role models. Four states
(Georgia, Ohio, Texas, and Utah) joined the mentoring program this year.

The National
Federation of the Blind has undertaken a contract with the National Library
Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped to conduct courses for Braille
transcribing and proofreading certification. Although our administration of
these courses began only in January of 2007, we have already processed more
than six hundred applications, graded more than one thousand course lessons,
and forwarded the names of nearly one hundred individuals to the Library of
Congress indicating that they have successfully completed the certification
courses in literary, mathematics, and music Braille.

Volunteers
from the United Parcel Service have worked with us in the National Federation
of the Blind for over ten years—most of the time in conjunction with our national
convention. United Parcel Service workers pride themselves on their willingness
to give of their time to the community, and we value their willingness to help.
We are seeking to expand our relationship with the United Parcel Service through
our volunteer infrastructure program, established to assist in bringing volunteers
to our state affiliates and local chapters to help with the work of the Federation
nationwide.

The Imagination
Fund encourages us to raise money for programs at the national, state, and local
levels of the Federation. Twenty-five grants to state affiliates, divisions,
or local chapters supported leadership-building seminars, a pilot computer training
program for senior blind people, peer mentoring for seniors losing their vision,
continued support for an Internet radio program called ThruOurEyes,
a parents’ seminar, and a transition fair for high school seniors.

As those at
this convention know, we have conducted our first-ever March for Independence.
We build with our spirit; but we also build with our feet. Many have told us
to sit still and wait, but we are marching to the sound of our own independent
drum, and we will make our Imagination Fund a powerhouse for the dreams that
we intend to accomplish.

During the
last year the Department of Affiliate Action of the National Federation of the
Blind provided hundreds of hours of rehabilitation training services to state
rehabilitation agencies in Florida, Texas, and Maryland. The purpose of this
initiative is to expound our positive philosophy of blindness to rehabilitation
service providers and to strengthen rehabilitation services to blind consumers
throughout America.

A rehabilitation
seminar for residential rehabilitation programs is being planned for December
of 2007, and the faculties of the NFB training programs in Louisiana, Colorado,
and Minnesota will be conducting much of the teaching.

We have also
helped with rehabilitation appeals. Ruth Harrington, a blind woman living in
Wyoming, sought to attend classes at the Colorado Center for the Blind, a training
program conducted by the National Federation of the Blind. However, rehabilitation
officials in Wyoming said “no." They argued that services available in
Wyoming are just as good as those in Colorado and that spending Wyoming dollars
out of state is reprehensible. We responded by pointing out that no comparable
rehabilitation program exists anywhere in Wyoming and that the placement statistics
for blind clients in the state are not merely dismal, but virtually nonexistent.
If Ruth Harrington relied on the skills and techniques of rehabilitation officials
in the state of Wyoming, she would wait for her training forever. We demanded
an appeal. Ruth Harrington got her training at the Colorado Center for the Blind,
and she is at this convention today.
In 2005 I reported that we had assisted Mary Evans in filing suit in the United
States District Court against the Pontotoc County School District in Mississippi.
Mary Evans is a blind teacher of Braille, who had provided service under contract
to blind students in the county until she began protesting the lack of commitment
of school officials to teaching their blind students. School officials fired
Mary Evans and hired in her place a woman who was not blind and who had only
a rudimentary knowledge of Braille. At a court proceeding this new teacher testified
that she did not know the Braille symbol for the plus sign or certain other
basic Braille contractions. Yet the school district claimed that they had hired
a qualified teacher.

I am happy
to report that the case is settled. The terms of the settlement are confidential,
but Mary Evans is in a better position than she occupied while contracting with
the school district.

For many years
we have been in litigation with Cardtronics to get the ATMs that they own and
operate to be accessible. Cardtronics is now the largest distributor of ATMs
in the world, with over 25,000 ATMs. They have announced that they will acquire
the ATMs at 7-11's throughout the United States, which will enlarge their fleet
to some 30,000 ATMs. We have now reached an agreement to settle the case. The
largest number of ATMs to become accessible to the blind through a single action
will soon be in operation. Cardtronics will also be paying the National Federation
of the Blind an amount to meet our legal costs of $900,000.

Last year
I reported that we filed suit on behalf of Mary Jo Thorpe against the Utah School
for the Deaf and the Blind. I am pleased that we were able to settle the matter.
The School has agreed to notify Mary Jo Thorpe of any openings as they become
available, to accept applications from any qualified blind or visually impaired
person, and to make a monetary payment.

A customer
of Acme Markets who tripped over the white cane of a blind employee sued and
won a verdict against Acme, claiming that it was negligent not to have a sighted
person travel with the blind employee in the aisles of the store and that Acme
had a duty to warn customers of the dangers created by having a blind employee.
We filed an amicus brief on the appeal, and the appeals court agreed with us
that the jury verdict was poppycock. The appeals court very logically explained
that when anybody, sighted or blind, comes to the end of an aisle in a grocery
store, that person cannot see what traffic may be coming—what obstacles may
be in the way—a foot, a grocery cart, or a white cane. It therefore behooves
every customer to take care to avoid hazards. Additionally, the court said that
reasonable people recognize that blind employees and others who use canes may
be found in many occupations. Customers should reasonably expect to encounter
disabled people. The decision of the appeals court upholds the right of the
blind to be abroad in the land and rejects the argument that our very presence
in a public place is an indication of danger. Though this is the right decision,
the fact that we had to argue in favor of it is an indication of how much we
must still do to ensure that our rights are not restricted or circumscribed
or diminished. For as long as the Federation has had life and breath, we have
fought to be a part of the world in which we live, and we are not willing to
relinquish one grain of the territory we have achieved.

Carl Jacobsen
is the president of the National Federation of the Blind of New York and a former
Randolph-Sheppard vendor. The State of New York claims that Carl Jacobsen cooked
the books while he was a vendor and has demanded that he pay more than $9,000
to the state in fees they say he owes. Perhaps I need not point out that Carl
Jacobsen is an outspoken, deliberate, aggressive leader of the blind in his
state. He has criticized public officials for their failure to provide the kinds
of service that the blind have a right to expect. We believe that the case against
Carl Jacobsen is retaliation for public statements he made criticizing the New
York Randolph-Sheppard program and its administrators. Officials of the State
of New York admit that they took special pains in auditing Carl Jacobsen because
of who he was. We are defending Carl Jacobsen, and we believe that an arbitration
panel will find that his financial records are accurate and that New York’s
audit is fatally flawed. We are also defending Carl Jacobsen’s right to criticize
those who do not perform as the blind have a right to expect.

Parnell Diggs,
president of the National Federation of the Blind of South Carolina, reports
that certain legislators in South Carolina colluded with staff members of the
Commission for the Blind to adopt a set-aside payment policy that would have
taken substantial amounts of money from the pockets of blind vendors in that
state. The policy created by the legislature violated provisions of the Randolph-Sheppard
Act, so the National Federation of the Blind of South Carolina sued the legislature
and the Commission for the Blind. Not only did the judge rule in favor of the
blind vendors and the National Federation of the Blind of South Carolina, but
attorney’s fees were also awarded in the amount of $30,362.25. It takes guts
to be a leader of the National Federation of the Blind, and Parnell Diggs has
plenty of guts.

Katie Colton
is a blind student completing middle school in Utah. She has asked school officials
to teach her Braille, but they have declined. They say that Katie Colton has
some residual vision, is not failing, and is therefore able to manage the work
without Braille. However, Katie Colton is blind, and the diagnosis for her is
that she will lose the limited vision she now has. We are helping with a legal
appeal, and we expect to ensure that Katie Colton’s right to read is not limited
by the uneducated opinions of school administrators. The Coltons are at this
convention, and Katie’s mother, Denise, gave a number of unsolicited donations
to the March for Independence.
Remodeling and upgrading the National Center for the Blind continues. In our
original building we have reconfigured one of our sleeping rooms so that we
have a completely wheelchair-accessible place for Federationists or visitors.

The roof on
the original building at the National Center for the Blind was installed more
than twenty-five years ago. It has been quite serviceable, but it is in need
of replacement. We are currently securing estimates for obtaining a new roof
and for installing additional insulation. In the original building we have many
different heating and air conditioning systems, installed as we conducted the
remodeling projects to put our building into shape. In our new building we have
a unified heating and air-conditioning system operated through a complex set
of controls. We are seeking ways to decrease the cost of operating our facilities.
Our energy bill for 2006 was quite substantial, and we are told that electricity
and gas prices are on the increase. With this in mind we are installing light
switches that switch off the lights automatically in certain areas when our
facilities are unoccupied; we are setting thermostats to higher temperatures
in the summer and cooler ones in the winter, adding insulation, and taking other
steps to increase our efficiency. We do not yet have estimates for all of the
work we plan, but I would suspect that the cost will be more than a million
dollars.

The National
Federation of the Blind Jernigan Institute that we began to build in 2001 has
never been quite complete. We took possession of the building in 2004, thinking
that the contractors would finish the details in a short time. We learned that
some of the tile in the Atrium had not been installed properly. This is now
proceeding in accordance with the experts’ recommendations. The estimate for
completion is the end of July 2007. All of the other remaining details of construction
have been finished, and we should have full possession of the Jernigan Institute
in shipshape order within the next few weeks.

Making certain
that contractors carry out the work as designed is a mammoth task, but we have
stayed with it, and I am proud of the magnificent result we are getting. In
the midst of refurbishing our Atrium, we have completed plans for the Wall of
Honor, installed appropriate electrical service, and designed the final appearance
of the wall. This should be in place before the end of 2007.

Last fall
we inaugurated the new version of our Web site at nfb.org with an updated look
and reorganized content. A constantly changing home page offers the latest events
and news about issues affecting the blind. More NFB literature than ever before
is available on the site. A wide range of audio and video can be accessed online
as well. Among the content are new Braille Monitor issues, Dr. Zaborowski's
"Straight Talk About Vision Loss" video series, news audio and video
clips featuring the NFB, and previously unavailable banquet speeches. An RSS
feed for Voice of the Nation's Blind has just been added.

Another new
service initiated this year is "Technology Tips" online for those
who want to learn more about technology for the blind. It can be found at our
Web site, <www.nfb.org/nfb/access_technology_tips.asp>.

The Kurzweil–National
Federation of the Blind Reader, released at our last convention, has continued
to improve throughout the year. It reads more than it did a year ago, and it
reads faster than it did a year ago. The machine represents visual capacity
that can be carried in a briefcase, which gives access to at least part of the
print world. It reads very well, and we anticipate additional developments.
Ray Kurzweil will be with us later during this convention to discuss the future
of the Kurzweil–National Federation of the Blind Reader.
A company established in Australia called Read How You Want has constructed
a technology that can transform print files into many different formats. With
this technology it is likely that many, many print documents can be produced
in Braille. We are contemplating joint effort with Read How You Want. The president
of this company, Chris Stephen, will also be appearing later during this convention
to tell us what his company and its technology can do.

In 2003 Dr.
Betsy Zaborowski became the first executive director of the National Federation
of the Blind Jernigan Institute, our newly erected building and our expanded
program to explore understandings about blindness, research, and training that
had not previously received as much attention as they deserved. The program
of the Institute was not completely unknown because it depended on the underlying
philosophy and purpose of the National Federation of the Blind, but how we would
implement the ideas that we had and how we would generate new ones were yet
to be determined. What I said to Dr. Zaborowski was, “Make the Institute work.
Imagine how you would like it to be, convince me that you are right, and help
me find the resources to build what we need.” In 2007 it is abundantly evident
that she has done everything we have asked. Much of this report reflects the
work of the Jernigan Institute, and many of the plans for the future are embodied
within programs generated by the staff and with the direction of Dr. Zaborowski
in the Institute.
Some time ago she told me that she was thinking of changing her workload. She
contemplated retiring as the executive director of the Institute, but she hoped
to continue making contributions to the effort and the spirit of the Federation.
Then came the cancer. For some months Dr. Zaborowski has been fighting a form
of cancer, and it appears that she is winning. She is at this convention, and
she will be making a presentation this very afternoon.

Mark Riccobono
has been our director of education within the Institute. As Dr. Zaborowski has
been unable to be at the National Center for the Blind, Mark Riccobono has taken
over the duties of directing the work of the Institute. He has had very little
notice, but he has performed extraordinarily well. I am confident that Mark
Riccobono will be able to manage the challenge of the Institute, bringing inspiration
and excitement to the work.

In the meantime
what will Dr. Zaborowski be doing? You will note that in the last two years
we have discussed the minting of a commemorative coin honoring the life and
work of Louis Braille. This coin must be sold if proceeds from it are to be
available for us to create a Braille literacy program. Somebody must direct
this activity. Betsy Zaborowski and I have discussed her doing so, and she has
told me that it is the kind of work which would make her heart leap with joy.

The Google
company has said that it wants to digitize the knowledge of the world and make
it searchable on Google. It has made agreements with many of the best university
libraries, such as those at Harvard, Stanford, and Oxford, to create digital
content of much of the material contained in them. Some of the Google content
is usable by the blind, but some of it is not. Therefore we have been engaging
in discussions with Google to ensure that the material that comes to be available
to sighted people through Google is also presented in a format that can be read
by the blind. A Google representative will be presenting information about the
commitment of Google at this convention.

Automobile
manufacturers are building vehicles that are quiet enough that they are hard
to hear. Blind travelers, not being able to hear these vehicles, face the danger
of stepping in front of them and being injured. We appointed a committee to
seek solutions to this problem, and we distributed information to the news media.
Yahoo News reported that the quiet cars story was, for a considerable time this
past winter, the third most read Internet news item.

The National
Federation of the Blind continues to be an active member of the World Blind
Union. A number of leaders from the Union are at this convention, and our participation
in world blindness programs stimulates development of activities in our own
country. A year ago the president of the European Blind Union, Colin Low, was
appointed to the House of Lords, and we have been discussing joint programs
with the blind in the United Kingdom. Lord Low will be addressing this convention.

We continue
to publish the Braille Monitor; Future Reflections, the magazine for
parents and educators of blind children; Voice of the Diabetic; and
many other documents. Through our Independence Market (formerly the Materials
Center of the National Federation of the Blind), we distribute literature about
blindness, canes, Braille writing supplies, electronic devices, and other products
of use to the blind—approximately two million items each year.

Almost four
thousand people came to the National Center for the Blind this year to learn
about blindness and to be inspired by the National Federation of the Blind.
More than a thousand of these people stayed overnight, and we served over eight
thousand meals to those visiting the Center from every state, the District of
Columbia, Puerto Rico, and a number of foreign countries.

As Federation
members know, I am a graduate of the University of Notre Dame, having matriculated
there from 1970 to 1974. I would never have been able to attend this first-class
university without the assistance and support of the National Federation of
the Blind. Some years ago the university asked me if I would be willing to have
my name and my picture displayed during the half-time programs of the football
games for Notre Dame as an honored graduate and a champion of the university.
I agreed to do so as long as our organization was named as well. Now a book
has been published entitled Notre Dame Inspirations by Hannah Storm,
a CBS anchor for The Early Show. The text on the front cover declares,
“The University’s Most Successful Alumni Talk About Life, Spirituality, Football—and
Everything Else Under the Dome.” I am among the thirty-two distinguished graduates
featured in this book. Also featured is the inspiring work of the National Federation
of the Blind.

Our programs
are more complex, more far-reaching, and more intricate than they have ever
been, but the circumstances we face are also increasingly complex and intricate.
Our public education programs have reached a significant segment of the population,
and the language used about blindness has changed, at least in part. In the
past blindness has meant weakness and pity. Sometimes today the words that come
to mind are strength and power. This does not always occur—the old thoughts
are still all too common, but sometimes it does, and occasionally we are considered
people of capacity, intellect, and joy.

As our Federation
continues, the fundamental elements that make us what we are do not change.
However, certain of the details of how we are perceived, of what we can accomplish,
and of who we can expect to become have altered. This change has come because
we have made it happen. We have said to ourselves, to members of government,
to officials in agencies for the blind, and to the public at large that we want
certain things—those specialized programs that are essential to meet our particular
needs, educational opportunities in the fields of our choosing, recognition
of our talents without prejudice or condemnation because of our blindness, acknowledgment
that we are an essential part of the decision-making that affects our lives,
and full equality with others.

Sometimes
people have responded to this by telling us that we ask too much. “You want
both specialized programs and equal treatment—pick one.” To which we respond,
“No, not now, not ever!” We have the will, we can muster the resources, we have
the energy, we have the faith in each other, and we have the guts. The equality
we seek will be ours. The opportunity we pursue is within our grasp. This is
our dream; this is our determination; and this is my report for 2007.